Читать книгу Search And Rescue - Valerie Hansen - Страница 12

FOUR

As soon as Ryder left Sophie he headed straight for Mrs. Mullins’s home to pick up Lily. When he arrived at the small, Spanish-style house, he lingered outside in his cruiser long enough to regain the strong self-control on which he prided himself. A man in command could not afford to show anger or weakness or any other emotion that would be detrimental to his position. More importantly, he didn’t want to upset his little Lily.

He found her in the living room, playing with Opal’s cats and telling them all about her wonderful dog. Maybe it was time to retire Titus. Yes, he got very excited when Ryder strapped on his official K-9 harness or vest but Sophie was right. He also tired easily.

Opal joined him in the archway to the living room when he paused to listen to the involved tale Lily was telling.

“She’s been like this ever since you dropped her off,” the middle-aged woman said. “What in the world did you tell her? She keeps warning my cats to look out for bad snakes.”

“We had a call tonight, over at the head trainer’s place. She was shooting snakes.”

“The slithery kind or the two-legged kind?”

“Slithery. She just about emptied her gun until she remembered about the human kind of snake and saved a shot or two. Maybe now she’ll carry an extra clip.”

Opal smiled, brown eyes twinkling, and patted the waist of her jeans. “I keep mine on an empty chamber, for safety. Staying alert is important for old ladies who live alone, particularly when there’s so much trouble in town. Besides, I have your girl to think of.”

“Why do you think I trust you with Lily?” Ryder asked, returning her smile. “Anybody who was an MP is bound to be a good, safe guard.”

“That was a long time ago.”

“You never forget,” he countered. “It’s like riding a bicycle. The programming sticks in your mind.”

“And muscle memory.” Opal’s grin spread. “Wanna see me fieldstrip a .45 auto blindfolded?”

“Maybe later.” Ryder eyed his child. “I promised the princess some ice cream.”

“You spoil her.”

“And love every minute of it,” he said.

That made Opal chuckle. “Wait until she’s a teenager, and then tell me you feel the same way.”

He sobered. “I’m not in any hurry.”

Her touch on his arm was gentle, motherly. “You should think about a mama for her, you know. Every girl needs a mother, particularly as she gets older.”

Ryder chose to turn the serious moment into a joke and arched an eyebrow. “Are you applying for the job?”

“Hah! I sure would if I was about thirty years younger. Of course, if you like your ladies real mature...” Opal patted her short cropped hair with one hand and rested the other on her hip.

“I’ll keep you in mind,” Ryder promised. “I know you can cook.”

“Yup. And I shoot straight, too.”

“Yeah.” His eyes were on Lily. “I just wish this was a peaceful little town again. Even after losing Melanie it seemed relatively safe here. Everybody thought her murder was an isolated incident for a long time.”

Opal sighed. “I know what you mean. How were we to know those other two fellas were victims, too? How’d that Carrie person choose ’em in the first place?”

“Because they reminded her of me,” he said quietly. “I told you she killed Melanie out of jealousy. After that, she apparently fixated on a rookie officer who had light-colored hair like mine. When Mike Riverton didn’t ask her for a date to the Police Dance two years ago she made his death look like an accident by pushing him down stairs. The following year, Brian Miller ignored her too and ended up dying in a fire when his house went up in flames.”

“You never told me all that before.”

Ryder nodded. “We held back details about the case and Carrie’s motive to keep from causing a panic. Besides, Veronica Earnshaw didn’t fit the victim profile.”

Staring at him earnestly, the older woman said, “No, but Carrie might have thought you were interested in her.”

“We can’t rule it out,” Ryder told her. “That’s a big reason why I don’t dare show favoritism to any woman. Not until Carrie’s caught and jailed.”

“Meaning, no dating.” Opal turned to gaze fondly at Lily. “That’s too bad.”

“It’s more than just dating. It’s what goes on at work, too. If Carrie even imagines I’m spending too much time with another woman, that woman will be in danger.” Like Sophie has been.

He shivered, then pulled himself together and banished destructive thoughts as he called out to his daughter. “Time to go, Lily. If we don’t get there before the Cactus Café closes, we’ll have to buy our ice cream at the mini mart.”

She proceeded to tell each cat goodbye before getting to her feet. “They want to go, too, Daddy.”

“Miss Opal doesn’t want them outside,” he countered.

“’Cause of the snakes, huh?”

“Right. And traffic and coyotes and all kinds of dangers. They were raised inside. This is what they know.”

“But you could protect them, Daddy. You can do anything,” Lily said, gazing up at him in adoration.

“I wish I could.” Ryder was thinking back to the night he’d been too caught up in his job to pick up his wife from town. That was the night Melanie had been ambushed.

In Ryder’s mind, no matter who had actually shot and killed her, part of the blame belonged to him. He’d be atoning for the rest of his life.

Grasping Lily’s hand and holding tight he led her to the door, then paused to peer out into the yard. Nobody, Carrie Dunleavy included, was ever going to take someone he loved from him again. Not while he still had breath in his body.

And after that? He set his jaw. He knew he should trust God in all things, even the life of his darling Lily, but he kept remembering Melanie. They had believed together that the Lord had blessed their marriage, so why had He allowed her to be taken?

An overwhelming sense of doom enveloped him. He scooped his daughter into his arms, held her tight and jogged to the patrol car. This must be the way Sophie had felt when she’d imagined a menace besides the snakes, he concluded. Instinct for self-preservation had kicked in and she’d reacted to it on a basic level.

One thing was clear. Some gut feelings were God-given and had better be heeded. To ignore them was not only foolish, it was akin to laughing in the face of his heavenly Father.

“Forgive me, Lord,” Ryder whispered as he fastened Lily in the backseat. A scripture verse popped into his head. “Lord, I believe. Help Thou my unbelief.”

No lightning bolts shot down from heaven. No angels sang. But Ryder was calmer, stronger, more self-assured as he circled to the driver’s side of the car. The Desert Valley police were going to catch whoever had been threatening Sophie, whether it turned out to be Carrie or not. As chief, he would see to it.

Only one thing took priority. The innocent little girl in the backseat. She always would.

* * *

Nervous despite her dog and reloaded pistol, Sophie had trouble sleeping. It didn’t help that Phoenix hogged the bed. She shoved him over and threw back the covers as soon as the sun began to peek over the top of the red rock horizon. Morning was usually one of her favorite times in the desert, with fresh, cooler air and pristine silence.

Today, however, she had enthusiastic company. Phoenix spun in circles at her feet and raced from the room as soon as her bare feet touched the floor. “Okay, okay. I’m coming.”

Not knowing how well he was trained, she figured it would be smart to slip some clothes on and let him out quickly. Boots didn’t exactly go with cargo shorts but she wasn’t letting her dog set foot in the backyard until she was sure there were no live snakes left.

She snapped a leash on his collar, tucked her gun into one of the pockets on the shorts and opened the back door. Except for remnants of last night’s carnage, the place looked deserted. Sophie hesitated. There was no guarantee that her front yard was clear, either, but at least it wasn’t messy, so she opted to reverse direction and lead Phoenix out that way instead of turning him loose inside the fenced area.

While he sniffed and wandered, unconcerned and therefore safe, Sophie checked the ground around the sides of her house. During her nocturnal unrest she’d reasoned that she’d been imagining hidden menaces so it was a shock to come upon wadded-up gum wrappers in the very place where she’d thought she’d sensed danger lurking.

“Oh, my...”

Her reaction was strong enough to cause the dog to take up a defensive position with his side pressed to her leg and hackles raised.

She laid a comforting hand on his head. “Good boy. I think we’re all right now but I’m going to call this in.”

Backing off, she led Phoenix away in order to keep from contaminating possible clues. As soon as she started to dial 911 she thought better of it. The last thing she needed was to cause a full-blown police response when the clues might mean nothing, and she sure didn’t want to phone James Harrison and ask for his bloodhound when he was romantically involved with Canyon County Gazette reporter Madison Coles who would be likely to want to put her in the news. Sophie then thought about summoning Whitney but she was a single mother with a baby to take care of and it was barely dawn.

“Face it,” Sophie muttered, disgusted with herself. “You aren’t fooling anybody. You want to call Ryder.”

He also had a child, but Lily was old enough to bring along if he chose. Besides, it would be advantageous to introduce Phoenix to Lily on neutral ground.

“Right. I need to be sure the dog likes kids,” Sophie told herself, immediately recognizing the excuse for what it was. Lame. However, that was not enough to keep her from calling him at home.

Instead of making small talk, Sophie began with, “I found some clues—chewing gum papers and foil—next to my house. I’m pretty sure they weren’t there before.”

“I take it this is Sophie.”

“Of course it is. I told you I was being watched. Suppose there’s DNA on the gum wrappers? I didn’t stop to see if there was any old gum lying around. I didn’t touch a thing and I kept the dog back, too.”

“Good for you.”

“Look, do you want me to call somebody else? I don’t particularly want a bunch of red lights and sirens charging over here again, not after the uproar last night. Which reminds me. Didn’t you say you’d come check the yard this morning? How is that any different than coming by now?”

“Well, for one thing Lily wouldn’t be with me later.”

Sophie suddenly saw his concerns. “You’re afraid to bring her here?”

He huffed. “I’m afraid to let her out of my sight, period.”

“I understand. Now that I think about it, I know I’ve noticed that brand of gum at either the police station or training center. I just can’t place exactly where. I could pick up the evidence and keep it clean but it wouldn’t be admissible in court since I’m no longer an officer of the law.”

Ryder yawned. “What are you asking me to do?”

“Come and get it.”

“I have minions for that.”

Sophie could tell he was chuckling and was not amused. “I was trying to keep from making a big fuss about it and getting everybody all riled up. You want to keep the good citizens of Desert Valley calm, don’t you?”

“Yes.” Another yawn. “Okay. Leave your evidence alone and keep the dog from getting into it. I’ll get dressed and be there as soon as I can.”

“Why don’t you come for coffee? If you change your mind and bring Lily I can fix pancakes for us all.”

“Not a good idea,” Ryder countered. “I don’t think it’s wise for me to be seen spending any private time with you.”

Sophie wanted to ask him if he was afraid of Carrie or of himself. She didn’t. Instead, she said, “Consider it a part of Phoenix’s training. I’d like to make sure he’s good with children.”

“Then meet us at the office some afternoon.”

“You’re right. Sorry. I’ll stay here and wait. Will you come by as soon as you drop her off?”

When Ryder said, “Yes,” Sophie felt such relief she almost sighed aloud.

She wasn’t afraid of facing enemies she could see. It was the hidden ones that set her nerves on edge. The ones like the gunman who had killed her partner while she was tracking another criminal.

Or the ones who patiently lurked in the shadows and chewed gum while they watched her try to keep from being poisoned by snake venom. No matter what anybody said, she still suspected that those snakes had been dumped over her back fence to do what vipers did best. To kill.

* * *

Ryder had donned his full uniform so he could go on to work once he was finished gathering evidence at Sophie’s. Her front door swung open before he reached the porch.

“Thanks for coming.”

He touched the brim of his cap. “Where’s the evidence?”

“Over there.” She gestured. “I’ll come with you.”

Waiting at the corner of the house until she joined him, he scowled. “Where?”

“Right...” Her jaw dropped. “It was right there.”

It went against his high opinion of her to doubt but he certainly had questions. “Could you be mistaken?”

“No, I saw foil and paper gum wrappers. Most of them were crumpled up so they wouldn’t be likely to blow away. Besides, there’s no breeze stirring this morning.”

Ryder arched an eyebrow. “That was my conclusion. So, what do you think happened to them?”

“How should I know?” Her voice was raised, her eyes wide. “They have to be here somewhere.”

“All right. We’ll circle the house first, then bring in a dog.”

Clearly, Sophie believed she’d seen clues, which was a point in her favor. Being unable to lead him to the scene was not.

“It was near this back corner,” she insisted. “The same area that had me spooked last night. Remember what I told you about saving ammo just in case? Well, this was where Phoenix was looking when I started to feel as if we were being watched.”

“So you assumed you’d see clues this morning?”

“No. I wasn’t even thinking of that when I stumbled on the gum wrappers.”

“Maybe. Maybe not.”

Whirling, she fisted her hands on her hips. If Ryder hadn’t been so disgusted to have been talked into participating in a wild-goose chase, he might have smiled at her uncompromising demeanor.

“I did not imagine a thing, Chief,” she said with conviction. “There were clues on the ground. Look. See the footprints?”

“Most every cop in Desert Valley was walking out here last night,” Ryder reminded her. “Any of them could have been chewing gum.”

“Okay, okay. Suppose you radio the station and ask if they were before you assume I’m lying.”

“I never said you were lying. I do wonder if your imagination isn’t working overtime, though. You were pretty freaked out last night.”

“Do you blame me?”

“Nope. It did surprise me that you assumed the snakes were part of a planned attack. The Arizona desert is their natural habitat. You must know they den up for winter.”

“It’s August and hotter than ever,” Sophie countered. “I know how snakes behave. If there was a den in my backyard I think I’d have discovered it by now. I’ve lived here for two summers.”

“Something around you may have changed. They could have lost their regular underground access to tunnels and been forced to seek another way in.”

“I’d think you’d be the first to suspect an attack, especially after I was shot at in the depot.”

As she spoke, Ryder was slowly making his way around her house. Roadrunners and flocks of smaller birds were busy cleaning up the mess near the back fence, making his job easier in one way.

He straightened when they returned to their starting point. “I suppose jays or some other species might have been attracted to the shiny wrappers and carried them off.”

“Birds? You’re blaming birds?”

Ryder let her barely controlled anger roll off him. Even if Phoenix didn’t strike a trail, Titus would let them know if there had been a prowler. “Go get the new dog and let’s see what he does.”

“Not on your life.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“You should,” Sophie told him. “If you gave my opinion a shred of credit you wouldn’t tell me to get a dog we know so little about. You’d bring in Titus and do the search properly.”

When she was right, she was right. Ryder nodded. “My apologies. I’ll go get Titus out of the car.”

“I should hope so.”

He could tell that Sophie was still miffed. Unfortunately, she’d been right when she’d guessed that he wasn’t treating her so-called report of clues seriously. Either she’d imagined seeing signs of a lurker or she’d invented one. There was no way things like that just disappeared on a totally windless morning. At least not so completely. When he’d mentioned the birds in the area he’d been giving her a chance to alibi away her error in judgment. Now she was going to be stuck with it.

Opening the rear door of his SUV he fitted the working dog with a special K-9 vest, snapped a long lead on his collar and signaled him to get out.

Titus’s tail wagged as eagerly as ever but his steps were slightly halting until he got warmed up. Knowing that the head trainer was observing them made Ryder extra cautious. Since they had nothing with which to offer a scent to the dog, he began to lead him in a circuitous path before rejoining Sophie.

She didn’t greet the happy dog as she would have under casual circumstances. Instead, she motioned to the ground where she’d noticed the bits of trash and said, “Seek.”

Ryder didn’t expect any reaction, let alone a strong one. The old dog snuffled the ground, disturbing dried grass and leaves, then kept his nose to the ground, wheeled and headed directly for the street.

Playing out the light lead, Ryder followed. Titus had not only struck a trail, he was acting as if the scent was fresh!

If he hadn’t been so biased in the first place, Ryder would have easily concluded that someone had returned recently and picked up the gum wrappers that Sophie had spotted. Now he was forced to reconsider.

Titus led him to the curb, then up the street several houses before he lost the trail.

Disgusted with himself and slightly contrite, Ryder turned to Sophie. “I owe you an apology. Somebody was in your yard, probably this morning, and they got into a car right here. We’ll need to check with the nearest residents to see if they noticed.”

“We can hope,” she said.

Frowning, he took her by the elbow and ushered her back to her house as quickly as possible.

“What’s the hurry? The gum chewer is gone.”

“Now, maybe,” Ryder said gruffly. “But stop and think. The only way anyone would have known you’d stumbled on those wrappers was by watching you do it.”